


although I was burning, you're the only light

by JoyfullyyoursDav



Series: Never Let Me Go (Twins' Mom AU series) [9]
Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Abandonment, Alternate Universe - Canon, Angst, Child Abandonment, Childhood Trauma, Dysfunctional Family, Established Relationship, Gen, Healing, Long Lost/Secret Relatives, Original Character(s), Post-Canon, Recovery, Trauma, Twins
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-03
Updated: 2018-04-03
Packaged: 2019-04-17 23:24:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,529
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14199906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JoyfullyyoursDav/pseuds/JoyfullyyoursDav
Summary: Taako and Lup find out that their mother has been looking for them. After a lifetime of being outcasts, will they choose to unearth their roots?





	although I was burning, you're the only light

**Author's Note:**

> PART 9 and omg sorry in advance for the angst  
> It's a long one but jeezy creezy there was some STUFF to unpack.  
> There will be one more installment of this story...thanks for coming along for the ride! 
> 
> Title is from Only for a Night by Florence + the Machines.

Istus had been right. In the days since the Hunger had been defeated, the twins had been healing. It was a slow, painstaking process. The trauma of what they’d all been through reared its head frequently. Kravitz was completely unequipped to deal with the turmoil of the living, having exclusively handled the dead for so long. He and Taako had struggled, taken breaks, even considered ending their relationship a few times. And as much as he could be, Kravitz was aware that Lup and Barry had struggled, too—thrilled to be together again, but re-learning how to live with that togetherness. How to rely on others again, after eleven years of having no one.

But seven years in, things had reached a stasis. A place where happiness came to roost more than anything else. A place with fewer nightmares, rarer arguments. Taako had stopped shutting Kravitz out as much, and in the last year especially, their relationship had achieved a level of peace and contentment neither of them had known was possible. They delighted in each other’s company, found solace in each other’s comfort.

So Kravitz was nervous, to say the least, when he returned home from meeting Leema. He didn’t want unhappiness to take hold of them all again. He didn’t want to be the bearer of news that would upset the balance they’d achieved.

It was just past dawn on their world. Barry was away, an overnight shift on the astral plane, and Taako and Lup were asleep. Not knowing how else to approach this, Kravitz woke them up. He tried to sound calm and nonchalant as he said, “I need to talk to you.” But there was an aura of anxiety as they stood in the kitchen five minutes later. Taako began making tea, and Lup, wrapped in a comforter, studied Kravitz with bleary eyes.

“The Raven Queen sent me to a different world today,” Kravitz said. “I wasn’t sure why at first. It’s strange, because it wasn’t my sector, so I couldn’t have reaped anyone even if I wanted to. I found a woman doing a blood-on-the-lily ritual to summon the Raven Queen.”

“Oh, shit,” Lup said.

“Do I need to be here for this?” Taako asked. “Sounds like a lot of reaper talk.”

Kravitz ignored him. “It’s a heavy ritual to be sure, but it’s normally something the Raven Queen will just take care of herself. So I talked to this woman, and she said she was trying to find…you.” Kravitz looked back and forth at Lup and Taako, his voice nervous but pointed. “She said…she said she was your mother.”

Silence hung like heavy linens between them. Taako glanced at Lup, whose mouth had fallen open. No one made a sound for a few moments, until a short, sardonic chuckle escaped Taako’s lips. It was a dry, angry noise that took Kravitz aback.

“Who?” Taako asked.

“Uh,” Kravitz said, uncertain. “Her name is Leema.”

“Yeah. _Who?”_

Lup glanced at her brother, then back at Kravitz. “What did she want?” she asked.

“We don’t have a mother,” Taako said.

“We used to,” Lup replied quietly.

“Who _cares_ what she wants?” Taako continued. “It’s a little late, don’t you think?”

“Taako, babe, shut up,” Lup told him lightly. “Krav?”

“Mostly she just wanted to know if you were okay,” Kravitz said.

“Did you tell her anything?” Taako’s voice was suddenly sharp, furious. His eyes narrowed. He looked angrier than Kravitz had seen him in quite some time.

“I told her that you were friends of mine,” Kravitz said, “and I told her you were alive and well. She asked other things, but—”

“You shouldn’t have told her shit,” Taako snapped. “You should have left without a word.”

Kravitz faltered. “Well, Taako, I was caught off guard,” he said. “I didn’t expect to meet your mother when I woke up today.”

“What else did she say?” Lup cut in before her brother could interject.

“A lot of things. She explained everything she’d been through to find you. She’s been looking for awhile, apparently.”

“Mm.” Taako crossed his arms. “Tell me something. Did she start looking before or after we became interstellar heroes?”

Kravitz paused, then said, “After.”

“Funny,” Taako said. “Funny how that worked out.”

“What did she tell you _exactly_?” Lup asked, and so Kravitz repeated all that Leema had said. Her life’s work, she'd called it, and he tried to relay it as accurately as he could remember. When he got to the part about communing with Dwyn, Lup covered her mouth with her hand and Taako looked ashen. After he was finished, Kravitz reached into his pocket. “She gave me this to give to you,” he said, and held out Leema’s letter.

Lup snatched it quickly, before Taako could. She read it with wide eyes, then passed it to Taako. He skimmed it. He didn’t want to give even _this_ much of a shit. He didn’t want to spend a moment of his life looking at words their mother had written. But sheer curiosity forced his hand. As he read, he felt a familiar heat creeping up and around his neck like a too-tight scarf, and he shoved the paper back at Lup when he was done.

“How do we know this person isn’t the average loony-tunes fan?” Taako asked.

Lup shook her head. “It’s too…specific,” she said. “And she talked to Pan and Istus. They’d be able to tell if—”

“She _said_ she did,” Taako interrupted.

“I met her on Iliodou,” Kravitz said, and Lup’s eyes widened.

“Yeah,” she said. “That’s our home.”

Taako scoffed. “Nope. Incorrect. That’s a hunk of rock we left behind,” he said. “And we left nothing and _no one_. The only people worth knowing are the ones we took with us.”

“I don’t disagree,” Lup said. “But maybe she’s changed. Maybe she’s trying to atone.”

The heat around his neck intensified, became unbearable. “Know what I’m really sick of?” Taako seethed. “I’m really fucking sick of people ruining my life and _atoning_ for it. Like, it’s old. I couldn’t give a shit about her atonement.”

Lup’s expression softened. She stepped closer to Taako and put a hand on his shoulder. And he wished she wouldn’t. He wished, for once, that she wasn’t able to look at him and see what was beneath, to listen to his words and hear what he really meant. In this moment, they both recognized the familiar ichor that was bubbling up inside him. It was both the root and the leaves of the matter. The place where he came from and the place he always returned. Love and trust twisting, warping into betrayal and pain, over and over again. A loop that, unlike all the others, would never end. He didn’t want to talk about Lucretia. He didn’t want to talk about their mother. He didn’t want to start talking about one, and end up talking about the other. But again, the loop. He couldn’t stop it. All he could do—all he’d been able to do for the past seven years, and the two hundred thirty before that—was ignore it. Push it back. Fend it off with avoidance and humor and disassociation and, eventually, anger. Trust only himself and, by extension, his sister. Everyone else was suspect. Everyone else had to be tested, tried, put through their paces and even then, they could fall into the loop so easily. Even after a hundred years, he could be forfeited.

Lup hugged him. “I know,” she said. Meaning, of course, that she knew it all. And he wanted to hate it, this knowing, but he didn’t. He didn’t have the energy to fight this, too. He hugged his sister and let it be.

Still holding him, Lup said. “I just don’t want to condemn someone based on the worst thing they’ve ever done. Fuck, Taako, if that’s how it works…I’ve done horrible things. Things that killed innocent people. Wiped out whole villages. If we’re measured by our worst actions, we’re all fucked.” She pulled back from the hug and shrugged.

“That was different,” Taako said. “We were trying to save the universe.”

“Do you think that matters to the people we hurt? The survivors?” Lup asked. “Do you think they lie down at night and think, ‘well, at least they were trying to save the universe’?” She smiled sadly at him. “Does it matter to _you_ , bud? Because that’s Lucretia’s argument for doing what she did.”

“Lup,” Taako said firmly. “I’m not talking about Lucretia, and I’m not talking about the relics. I’m talking about a mother abandoning her kids.”

“Okay,” Lup said. “So if we’re talking about _that_ , what about Merle? He abandoned his kids for a while, too. We still hang out with him.”

Taako threw up his hands in frustration. “That’s different, too. Merle’s kids had another parent. They weren’t homeless.”

“As far as he knew.” Lup sighed. “Look, I’m not saying what our mom did wasn’t fucked up. It was. And I’m not saying we have to do anything with this information, because we don't. All I’m saying is that condemning someone for a horrible thing they did—considering the horrible things _we’ve_ done—doesn’t feel right.”

Without warning, Taako picked up the kettle that had been heating over the wood stove and threw it, as hard as he could, against the far wall of their home. Near-boiling water spouted down the wall and seeing the steam gave him a moment’s satisfaction as he whirled back around to face his sister. “We saved the multiverse, and she abandoned us as babies,” he said through gritted teeth. “What did we do, huh? What did we do as _babies_ to deserve that?”

“Nothing,” Lup said immediately.

“And that doesn’t make you mad? You, with _hella wrath_? You’re not upset about this?”

“I am,” she replied slowly. “But I’m also…curious.”

“Yeah, well,” Taako snapped, pushing past Kravitz to leave the room. “Be curious. Go and meet her, for all I care. I’m good out here.”

Kravitz took a deep, shaky breath after a door down the hall slammed shut. “Shit,” he muttered. “I—I guess I wasn’t expecting that.”

Lup smiled at him, a weary one that didn’t reach her eyes. “I would’ve expected worse, honestly.”

“It’s just…he’s never talked about any of that, you know? I didn’t know it—I guess I didn’t understand—”

“Some wounds are...tricky,” Lup replied, shrugging. She pulled the comforter around herself tighter. “I’ll let him cool off for awhile. He’ll come around. Or he won’t. Either way, he'll be okay.”

Kravitz scratched the back of his head, suddenly feeling very awkward. “And…you?” he asked. “How are you feeling?”

Lup sighed. “I don’t know. This is…a lot.”

“Well, you’re not freaking out like Taako, so I just wondered…”

“If being a twin has taught me anything, it’s that two people can live the exact same life and feel differently,” Lup said. “I was affected by our childhood too, obviously. But it didn’t knock me down the same way it did for Taako. His self-esteem took a big hit, you know? And maybe…maybe that’s my fault. Maybe he’s been more affirming to me than I’ve been to him.”

Kravitz shook his head. “Not a chance, Lup. Sorry. You bolster him up like it’s your job. You inflate his ego _too_ much, probably.”

Lup chuckled. “Yeah. Probably a bit of overcompensating on my part.”

“Either way," Kravitz said, "you’re just different people. It’s not anything you did wrong.”

“Yeah.” Lup picked up Leema’s letter again, staring at it for a few moments. “Anyway,” she said. “I’ll talk to him later. It’ll all be okay.” She looked up at Kravitz. “Thanks for telling us, Krav. And…thanks for talking to her, too.”

Kravitz nodded, and Lup shuffled out of the kitchen, pressing Leema’s letter against his chest as she went. Kravitz stood alone for a time, holding onto the parchment he had brought from a different world. Waiting for what would happen next.

 

Taako and Lup didn’t talk until nightfall. Lup approached him and just said, “Roof?” and he nodded once. So they climbed onto the rooftop of their little house, lying down and looking up at the stars. They did this sometimes. It was a habit they’d picked up long ago, as children during their many roofless nights. They found it easier to talk—about where they’d go next, where they’d been, all the bad things that might happen to them—while looking up at the dark sky. It was, they realized later, where their willingness to space-travel had begun. And it was a habit they continued during their century-long voyage, lying on the deck of the Starblaster, a place where skies were never in short supply.

Now it was something they returned to on nights like these, when they had a lot to talk about and wanted, for a moment, to feel small. Insignificant. Like their problems weren’t insurmountable. Like they could talk through anything.

“You know what I think about a lot?” Lup asked him.

“What’s that?” Taako said.

“How this sky isn’t the same one we grew up looking at.”

“Yeah. I thought about that a lot when I remembered the two suns.”

Lup reached over and grabbed his hand. “This isn’t the same sky that our mom looks at. I wonder if any of the stars are even the same.”

Taako sighed. “You want to meet her,” he said, his voice hollow.

“I don’t know,” Lup said. “I think I do.” She paused, then added, “You know that ritual she was doing to talk to the Raven Queen? Well, almost no one survives it. She had to know that, going in. She was willing to die to contact us.”

Unexpected fury clutched him again, and he said, “I won’t forgive her.” And again, he realized he could be talking about Lucretia, or Leema, or both, and the truth of that rang in his ears. And _fuck_ , now there were tears in his eyes, and he bit his lip, hard, to keep from crying.

“No one’s asking you to,” Lup told him gently. “ _I’m_ not asking you to. I’m on your team, Taako. Always.”

“I know.” He wiped his eyes defiantly.

After a few moments of silence, Lup said, “You can do what you want, you know. I’m not asking you to do anything.”

Taako sighed. “If you do it, I’ll do it too, Lulu.”

“But if you don’t want to meet her, we don’t have to.”

“No. We probably should, right?”

Lup smiled at him. “You told me once that sometimes there aren’t right decisions. There are just decisions. Maybe this is one of those times.”

Taako squinted up at the sky, trying to remember the constellations of his youth. Trying to remember if anything good in his life had stayed the same. And then Lup squeezed his hand and he thought, of course. This. This one good thing was perpetual. Unbroken, untouched. And he smiled back at his sister, and although he still felt unsure, said, “Okay. Let’s do it. Let’s meet Leema.”

**Author's Note:**

> p.s. you know I _had_ to do a callback to Taako's "who?" heard 'round the world.


End file.
